How Aizen Recovered His Rightful Groove
by Gliblord
Summary: Gin and Aizen reflect on just how they got so ridiculously, plotbendingly powerful. NOTE: DEADFIC.
1. Lockjaw

Where the tip of Aizen's blade was held aloft, a tiny star twinkled brighter, spreading aggressively like a blot of ink while little Ulquiorra's eyes seemed to dilate just as big. Aizen flicked his sword to the side, and the new moon rolled down from the clouds into the slight mountains littering the horizon. The infant arrancar studied the orb's course across the desert until, apparently satisfied with the legitimacy of Aizen's power, he looked up at his master with subdued admiration. Aizen grinned at this and, nestling the moon by its brother between two tall peaks, drew back two paces to admire his handiwork. When he'd discovered with his first batch of espada that shinigamification would regress the prospective Adjuchas before it accelerated its growth, he was disgusted and had Gin slay the most malformed ones at once. But now that he had won the Hougyoku and mastered the shinigami art of memory modification, he realized that were certain advantages to raising his subjects as children, and Ulquiorra was a prime example of this. The light of the twin moons threw Aizen's features into sharp relief; at least, in Ulquiorra's mind, he shadowed the spirits surrounding him as surely as the tall tower of Las Noches. The breathtaking beauty was of course nothing more than an illusion. Then again, according to Aizen Sousuke, most things--like love, ethics, and soon, he hoped, death--were illusions, a view reinforced by all the time he'd spent staring into the nightmare void in the sky of Hueco Mundo. On nights like these, when the wind swept gently across the pallid dunes surrounding Aizen's stronghold, Hueco Mundo appeared as nothing more than a cauldron in which his most promising plots could brew until they were ripe for the hatching. Or a big ball of dough, to be molded to his will. Or...

"What do you think, Ulquiorra?" chuckled Aizen. He'd always nurtured an affection for... extended metaphor.

The half-masked toddler waddled towards the towertop edge and stood on his tip-toes, reaching skyward with undeveloped arms as though attempting to push the sphere into orbit again. "It looks like a cookie," he deadpanned. "Like what Ichimaru-sama gave me for breakfast this morning."

"I mean of the sword, young one. How did you like its performance?"

"It did all that?" Ulquiorra said, pretending not to have already understood that. He gazed up at Aizen with a wonderment that was only partially affected. Would his lips ever be able to curl up the way Aizen's did?

"What's this?" Aizen closed his eyes and sheathed his sword, his grin vanished. "You look disappointed."

"No, I'm not!" Ulquiorra blurted, to his own surprise. "Please," he whispered, " I want to be your espada!"

Sousuke's smirk returned like a boomerang. "Go to bed, Ulquiorra. Swords require plenty of rest as well as plenty of battle. Currently you are dull and useless. If you want to become part of my arsenal you will have to sharpen yourself. Tomorrow you shall receive your sword. Think of it as an unusually long and deadly key to unlocking your hidden potential."

"Understood, Aizen-sama." Baby Ulquiorra bowed and disappeared. Master Aizen tucked his hands inside opposite sleeves and stepped evenly down the stairs after him. As the Lord of Las Noches strolled down its happy midnight halls, he rapped once on each espada's bedchamber door, knowing each knock would fire like a cannon in his or her dreams. For in the fortress of Las Noches, only the master's footfalls made noise.

_"Then enemies will be able to sneak in without our knowledge!" Tousen once objected._

_"You're missing the symbolism, my friend. wha better way to demonstrate the extent of our domination than to conquer perception itself?"_

_"Just be sure to keep a thorough enouch watch. I know how lazy you people can get around here."_

_"Says the man who can't fix his hair properly without Hisagi's help?"_

_"Being blind doesn't help, wise ass. I mean, Aizen-sama."_

That man never showed his hair due respect, Aizen brooded. izen spent hours prepping and trimming his hair, and had been since he was twelve... which, come to think of it, was twelve thousand years ago. Aizen smiled at the thought as he reached Door number 4, Ulquiorra's room. Aizen knocked exactly twice, and put his ear to the keyhole. H heard Ulquiorra jump out of his sheets, confused. He'd been sleeping soundly, just as he'd been ordered to.

Aizen grinned ever broader and, running a hand through his flawless mane for no reason, resumed his nocturnal jaunt. Ulquiorra was the latest addition in a burgeoning collection of blades, and already one of his mosty promising. Intriguingly, the infant espada's skill was instinctual, meaning Ulquiorra had known basic fencing technique before his lungs could know breath. As pleased as he was with the Hogyoku's superbly seamless splicing, he was more interested in the experiment's unexpected results--the proof that no two were born equal, and that Aizen was born best of all. Hm. Surely the indisputability of his supremacy warranted a nice spot of Ichimaru's tea?

Yet another smirk graced his Aizenly perfection as he approached his lieutenant's chamber at the end pf the hall. Alas, this smirk would prove one too many. Aizen halted in his tracks and gingerly inspected his sightly face with his plain fingers. Hmm... His cheeks were still downy as a child's... his chin still stern as a centurion's... Yet something was decidedly wrong. So what, to borrow Gin's term, was the dealio? Then it struck him. His fingers fell to his immaculate lips. No, it couldn't be... A single bead of sweat dripped melodramatically from the business end of Aizen's handsome coif. He would have gasped, but for his lockjaw. He would have turned white, if he weren't (as Tousen put it) such an outstanding cracker already . He would have--

No! Now was not the time for extended metaphor. Now was the time for calculation and composure. His face was stuck, for crying out loud! What could he have done to deserve this!? Aizen raised a knuckle, hesitated, then knocked twice on Ichimaru's puerta, which burst open instantly.

"Who is it?" Ichimaru sang. "...Hah?"

Aizen rubbed his nonpareil hair counterproductively, his smile belying his frustration.

"Ah, there you are, Aizen-taichou! Whatcha doin' on the floor?"

Aizen struggled to open his mouth, but irony had dealt him a dastardly hand. Ichimaru knelt down and offered his own hand, even as his own everlasting grin eclipsed Aizen's world.

"What's the matter, Aizen-taichou?" Gin's taunting laugh invaded Aizen's brain. His sinister eyes unlatched, and the laugh magnified tenfold. "CAT GOT YOUR TONGUE?"

Aizen clasped Ichimaru's hand.

"That's it, Aizen-taichou. Yeh'll be back on your feet in no time!"

Gin's bedroom was an odd one indeed. For one, a chime strung with shards of broken Hollow masks, which clacked against each other like a danza macabra, swayed from the ceiling. It also lacked a bed.

Gin's bedroom was an odd one indeed. For one, a chime strung with shards of broken Hollow masks, which clacked against each other like a danza macabra, dangled from the ceiling. It also lacked a bed. Aizen leaned against the wall instead, determined to survey his servant with a coldness he hoped would distract from the stupid, static, insipid smile now befouling his gorgeous visage so--

"I'm somewhat aware," quipped Gin as he prepared his legendary herbal tea, "how perpetual grinning has graduated to something of a defining feature amongst our number. But it ain't. It was mine first, dammit!"

Aizen stared on.

"Ah, yeh know I jest," Gin continued. "Funny, though... yeh caught me during one of my quotidian rounds of meditation. I'm sure yeh're curious what I was meditating about when yeh came to my door!"

Aizen rolled his eyes.

Ichimaru craned over his solitary pouffe to pour two steaming cups of tea. Aizen helped himself to one and, forgetting he could not open his mouth, promptly spilled its contents all over himself. "MMMMMMMH!"

"Splendid!" Ichimaru seemed to take Aizen's agony as an affirmative grunt.

Lord in heaven, this is what a woman's scorn must feel like!

"I was dreaming about the day I learned to smile."

Aizen startled out of his dolorous trance. What had happened? What had triggered the fox in him!? He had to know!

Gin took a deep breath. "Well, Aizen-taichou," he started, "it all started when I happened by a pretty little blond splayed on the soil, moaning how hungry she was..."

Sousuke whacked himself on the forehead. This was getting nowhere.

"I don't get it... a square?" Ichimaru squinted (though one couldn't really tell) to decipher Aizen's charades. "Oh, I love this game! Okay... a square... scribbling... a pen! You want a pen! And parchment!"

Aizen gave him a thumbs-up where once a simple smile would have sufficed. Oh how he longed for this ordeal to be over soon...

"Yay, I got it right! Hold on a sec..." Ichimaru rummaged the chest next to the marble bust in his likeness. "Ah, here it us." He blew the dust off the cover and passed it on.

[The Tome of Most Torrid Love, or A Catalog of the Life of Ichimaru Gin, by Ichimaru Gin

Aizen hastily skimmed through what was essentially Gin's journal, worried he'd never be able to repress the doodles of Gin and Rangiku that crowded each page in their (ahem) promiscuity. How many different positions could there be...?

Finally, he found it: the miraculous blank page.

PLEASE HELP ME, he scrawled in large, loopy script. I'VE FALLEN, AND I CANNOT SPEAK UP.

"The answer is simple, Aizen-taichou. Just use something sturdy to pry your mouth open," he reasoned. "Here, give this crowbar a go."

Aizen raised an elegant eyebrow in majestic puzzlement. WHY DO YOU KEEP A CROWBAR ON YOUR PERSON? he wrote.

"I don't think I understand the question, Aizen-taichou."

Aizen gestured a beleaguered sigh (how, your guess is as good as mine), which Gin eagerly took as his cue to wedge the crowbar between Aizen's teeth and tug with all deliberate might. If Aizen had believed soaking oneself in scalding tea was the height of pain, he now knew better. After the fifth long minute of Gin's hysterical mouth-jimmying ("Just you wait, Aizen-taichou! Ninth time's a charm!"), neither of their smiles budged, but Aizen began to suspect that a nice sword to the gut would have been a preferable end. Unable to communicate his displeasure, Sousuke could only count on Ichimaru's sense of mercy to activate. Any second now, Gin would sympathize and stop...

The day Ichimaru ripped the ears off a helpless rabbit to wear as snowshoes crossed his mind.

This could take a while... he winced, eyes streaming.

"Hah? It's not working." Gin held the harsh steel up to his face and examined it with blind glee. "Is it the wrong model? Maybe if I pour my reiatsu into it..."

"Rmmrh! MMMMRH!"

"No?" Ichimaru purred. "Well then what other recourse is there, Aizen-taichou? Unless... Supposing something more lissome than a lever could do the trick?"

Aizen nodded vigorously, relieved.

"Wait a mo'..." Rummaging once again through his chest, he pulled out a gilded volume of considerable heft. "There ought to be a clue in the Anaetomica Scinigamus! This wonderful book has helped me since college to more competently butcher choice body parts. And it says here that the tongue is the strongest muscle! Try poking your mouth free from the inside."

Sousuke hung his had, massaging his temples. It'll be over soon. It'll be over soon.

"My bad. It clarifies that only the most serpentine tongues can prize lockjaw. Look, they've got a diagram." Ichimaru tilted his head. "Hey, that sorta looks my tongue..."

Oh no.

"Guess that's it then." Gin pinned an unsuspecting Aizen to the wall with lightning speed. "Yeh may not like it. I may not like--Oh who am I kidding." His lips were very close to his to be chatting. "Of course I'm gonna like it. I'm me."

No.

"You know, with that silly smile plastered on your face, yeh look just like the mannequins I used to practice on..."

No!

The ghostly chimes above Gin rattled with passion equal to their owner's. Unfortunately, his fun was about to be cut short.

"Aizen-sama..."

"Ulquiorra?" said Aizen, looking down. "What are you doing here?"

"Hah? You look disappointed, Aizen-taichou!"

"Finally! I can talk again! And I'm not smiling anymore! In fact, I'm sporting a rather ravishing moue."

"Aizen-sama... What were you just doing to Ichimaru-sama? He looked happy. Can you do it to me?"

"Absolutely not!" Aizen decreed, with a joy belying his frown. "Didn't I tell you to stay in bed!?"

Twin tears ran down Ulquiorra's chibi face. "Understood, m-master. It's just... you woke me up..."

"LEAVE ME!"

Ulquiorra bowed at once and disappeared.

"Honestly, Aizen-taichou, I think yeh just scarred that kid for life," appraised Gin, stroking his hairless Asian chin. "Yeh know, tonight will be the last time Ulquiorra can lie by sayin' 'I wasn't born yesterday.' I think that's special."

"How did he even get in?" asked Aizen.

"I believe the door was left open, Aizen-taichou. By you, it would seem."

"The door was... do you mean to say anybody could have seen...?"

"It depends. What do yeh wanna hear?"

Aizen ran his hand through his hair casually and smiled a measured smile. "I sure hope this doesn't catch on with our impressionable young charges during arrancar orientation tomorrow. By the way, Gin. Do you ever go to sleep?"

"Nope," said Gin.

"I'll see you in the morning then."

"Bye bye!"

He sauntered back to his room in high spirits. Tomorrow would be a telling day.


	2. A Telling Day

**A Telling Day**

All across the pale sands of Hueco Mundo, the domed walls of Aizen's domain could be seen reflecting the moon above, which beamed down on Las Noches like a proud mother her children. Of course, the Hollows outside the moon's touch derided the fortress as nothing more than a bulbous eyesore. Aizen didn't know whether these detractors were jealous or merely foolish, but he did know that they would kneel at his doorstep in due time. At this juncture, Aizen was more concerned with opinion within his own ranks. How often had he seen the son turn against his father... how often had he orchestrated betrayal? He understood traitors were the rule rather than the exception. The only problem lay in how much his plans banked on a retinue of loyal, grown arrancar to do his persuading for him. For who without an army can turn so much as a snowflake? Well, technically, anyone could, but it wouldn't be as much fun. Sousuke decided to revise the metaphor--only he would benefit from an inner monologue, of course, but shouldn't one always strive to better one's poetic prowess? He liked "snowflake" too much to dispense with the image just yet, but could he tastefully juxtapose it with imperialist talk of worlds and wars? And wasn't he running out of synonyms for "white"? There were still "silvery," "pearly," and even "hoary," but that one always left a bad--

_**"AIZEN-SAMA!**__** I BOW AT YOUR COMMAND!"**_

Whoa!

"Guh!" he choked, thoroughly shocked. He'd just narrowly missed tripping over a wayward mop. "What the...?"

Aizen reflexively charged a level eighty-seven killing spell in his hands until he looked down and saw his unwitting aggressor's bloody, dumb smile. Literally bloody, since the stunted hatchling arrancar had woken up this morning to find rows of razor sharp teeth lining his gums. A chapter ago Aizen had experienced a similar oral ordeal, so he swallowed his rage and patted the boy on his enormous turban-y helmet. "What's your name?"

_**"AIZEN-SAMA!**__** YOUR WORD IS MY LAW!"**_

"And I appreciate it," he frowned, picking his ear. "Now stand tall, soldier, and continue scrubbing the halls. Remember: perfectly white or no souls for supper."

_**"YES, AIZEN-SAMA!**__** Anything--"**_

"Adagio," gestured Aizen wincingly. "Slower. Softer."

The child with the cumbrous skull inhaled deeply, then spoke with some measure of restraint (he'd learned a new way to talk!). "...Anything for you, Aizen-sama! I look forward to the day I can trade in this mop for a real sword!"

"Your zeal is opportune, soldier. That day is today!"

_**"WHAT!?"**_

Aizen unplugged his ears patiently, and, swiping a sopping wet flyer off the floor on which he was kneeling, handed this to him. "Next time, I trust you'll watch where you're swinging my equipment. Honestly, knocking the posters off the walls... I may even be forced to reconsider your knighting--"

"NO! I Won't dissapoint you again! I PROMISE!" The kid bolted away immediately, leaving his master with nothing but an expression of sour confusion. "Something tells me he's wrong to swear that."

"Oh? Was it a little birdy?" warbled a gaily familiar voice. "I do love birdies."

Aizen, his scowl ravishingly immovable, slid his hands inside his sleeves and didn't look back. "I'm afraid it was nothing so extraordinary, Gin. Merely my intuition."

"But your intuition _is_ extraordinary, Aizen-taichou! Don't tell me yeh're gonna be poutin' forever now. Or are yeh just fishin' for compliments?"

"Why couldn't I sense that child's reiatsu before I stubled over his mop? Sometimes... maybe I'm getting old..."

Gin plopped his head on Aizen's shoulder and snaked an arm down his chest. "Whactha thinkin'?"

Aizen stared at the ceiling of the hall gravely. It was.. white. "It's just... I remember now. He's the one who 'forgot' his name the moment he became shinigamified, isn't he?"

"Who, that _janitor_ kid?"

"Yes. I fear he may be sent by a foreign agent to subvert me. First nameless, now undetectable? This incident sets me ill at ease. I a portent of my demise born already? Is mutiny sown against me so early?"

"Conversely, Aizen-taichou, he _could_ just be an idiot with no reiatsu."

"I must be rid of him as soon as possible, Gin. If destiny believes she can frighten me into submission, then I will show her I can deal on equal terms. But how to arrange the death of the ordained?"

With speed not even Aizen could follow, Ichimaru appeared in front of him, robes flapping cooly about his ankles. "Hah! Shouldn't we at least name the kid before we have him whacked? It's only the right thin' to do."

"As you wish," Aizen sighed. Ichimaru pulled Aizen's chin level and gazed (as best he could) into his eyes. "How about 'Fizzy Winklepoppins'?" he said, gunning for a rise. "I gave the kids some grape soda this morning--gave him some extra, felt bad about his teeth. I gotta say, I don' think I've ever seen somebody so happy! Exceptin' in the mirror, of course."

"No, Gin. It must be a title that will draw ridicule and scorn from his peers. A descriptor that will adequately capture the child's unenviable ineptitude. He must be made an example of how not to act. Furthermore, his unavoidably ignominious failure will enhance his comrades' esteem and standing, as they come to comprehend that failure equals death."

"In other words, he's a 'plot' device."

"...In a matter of speaking, yes. A 'plot device' of almost singular importance, if I am to begin my campaign of conquest. You may even dub him a... plot device-roy."

"Excellent pun! But can't we just name him 'Di Roy' for short?" plen Gin, eyebrows arching up. "I'm already starting to forget everyone's names!"

"Fair enough. Jot the name down in the archives. As soon as you do, the name should insert itself telepathically into Di Roy's mind, so there's no need to tell him."

"Ah, that's good. I was going to take a nap! Off to the archives then!"

"Good man. Remember, the presentation is at six. Oh, and for the record, I was indeed 'fishing for compliments,'" Aizen smiled at last.

Gin vanished without another word, and Aizen resumed his aimless ambles.

---

Di Roy sat inside a secluded janitor's closet, attempted to scratch his head (without success, for his turban forbade it) as he pored over the printout over and over again. It was around the seventh and eighth time he'd taken in the loaded paragraphs of text that he realized he had no idea how to read.

Di clutched what little of his Scandanavian white hair he could and screamed. Thinking was an excrutiating experience for him, which in turn made everything else Di Roy encountered unbearably painful. Yet a thought was doggedly climbing the dark dead creases of matter that only nominally amounted to a brain to the forefront of his shrivelled mind--he could recognize one of the characters (6) was also the number etched on his best buddy's bedchamber door! Well, his buddy of two days... 

Miraculously, or very, very improbably, yet another thought wrenched itself out from under the nightmare slop, (though it may well have been helped up by the previous thought). Gimmjow was an espada... which probably made that meathead literate! Maybe, if Jaggerjack helped him, he could take the flyer and... and...

Could it be? Could his brain yield triplet thoughts? Three thoughts were his daily limit, so it was vitally important he remember his name---but it was equally vital he finish his train of thought! Di creased his forehead and began breathing hard. "C'mon... push!"

He could feel his intellect contracting... it was coming! The moment of truth!

_I like grape soda!_

---

As Gin rounded down the shadowy staircases to the lowest level of Las Noches, he refe;cted on the many millions of reasons he chose not to visit Kaname Tousen's quarters before today. Gin was fully aware of the gravity of his homie's disability, but that didn't mean his lair had to be so damn creepy either. Normally Gin enjoyed treks in the cold, but not the airless chill that governed these halls, no sir! This wasn't some hike up a lovely Japanese snowcone mountainside. This was more like a sweaty, suffocatin' spelunk through a sooty-walled, man-sized belfry. Not pleasant, was what he was gettin' at. Gin pit on one hand as he felt his way through the narrow passage. He reminded himself how sweet a dude Kaname was to hang out with...

_"Why should we give in to death?"_ Tousen had confided once. _"Eternal life is the birthright of all spiritual beings. That alone is justice..."_

Hahah! Amen, brother. Gin had listened raptly until the talk turned to justice and righteousness and whatnot. That was usually the point where his thoughts began to drift...

_"Oh Gin! Gin, I love you!"_ ringed an ecstatic voice that sounded suspiciously like Rangiku's in his perverse noggin. _"Stick your long __zampakuto__ into my waiting--"_

Ah! His searching fingers clasped vaguely around a brass doorknob. Knock knock! "Sup, Kaname-san!"

"Ggggrrrrgh..." the door grumbled. "Ichimaru?"

"Aw man, I was hidin' my reiatsu. Howdja guess?"

"Your voice, you dolt."

"Ah, word, word. Listen, could I borrow yehr sword for a sec?

"Why do you need it?" With a grudging yawn, Tousen slid out of bed into his princely loafers and deigned to open the door. The sudden shaft of light made Gin feel fuzzy.

"Whoa, didn't mean to wake yeh..."

His purple dreads depended in a grumpy tangle, and his eyes blinked bare and visorless. "Why do you need the sword?" he repeated.

"Well, I've got this annoying wad of gum between the grooves of my sandle..."

SLAM.

Knock knock!

"What?"

"C'mon, Kaname-san, I was just joshin'. Aizen needs Suzumushi for the presentation."

"But it can't possibly be time yet..."

"It's five to six."

"What!? Why didn't you wake me up earlier!?" Tousen gripped Gin by the collar against the half-shadowed wall and pulled his face intensely close, but seconds later his anger faded and introspection prevailed. "I remember lying down to nap around noon and... it was just going to be a couple hours' break, I even ordered an espada to check on me. Grah! Hold on, let me throw something on."

Tousen left the door slightly ajar as he rummaged through his disordered shelves and closets. A solitary band of light bled through the hinges, touching Gin's tabi. Gin crossed his sleeves and started tapping his foot. "Aaaaaaah..." Gin's mouth hung open like a turkey's. He couldn't discern the ceiling inches above his head, but it was probably very white. "Three minutes, Kaname!"

"Hold your goddamn ponies!" he called gracefully.

"Okay, okay!" Gin scratched his calf with a toe, which then immediately resumed tapping with the rest of his foot. Inside, the sound and fury of frantic drawer-delving was reaching a crescendo. He counted prime numbers in his head. _1... 2... 3... what was I counting again?_ He reached 1,619 before Tousen finally burst out panting.

"Nake, Suzumushi!" The sheath, held firmly aloft by Kaname's bare hand, chirped and trembled until it threw its own light, like a firefly. The way up now lay clear for Ichimaru. Man! How many other things could Tousen's sword do!? No wonder Aizen wanted it!

"There. You can see. Now let's hurry!"

"Wait... yeh spent all that time in there and all yeh donned was your visor?"

"Blind much?" Tousen snapped.

"Good point! Besides, I always thought the visor was the most becoming piece of your ensemble!" Gin lied serenely. "But I liked the scarf just as much! And the gloves!"

Before Tousen could respond, Gin's reiatsu altogether disappeared. Tousen gritted his teeth and sprinted up the spiral staircases after him. "Damn him, damn his speed, damn it all to hell!"

Tousen would likely have spent his next breath disparaging his comrade's lack of skin pigmentation (and corresponding lack of courtesy) when he felt Ichimaru zip up behind him and pick him up a la newlywed. "Hah! Yeh didn't think I'd leave without yeh, did yeh?"

"Ichimaru..." Tousen's blank eyes widened as he realized what this would look like. "Ichimaru Gin, unhand me immedi--"

---

_Yammy... __Aaroniero__ Arleri... __Nnoitra Jiruga... __Zomari LeReoux... __Grimmjow __Jaggerjack..._

Ulquiorra pronounced the name of each new arrancar perfectly and measuredly, hitting the correct intonation from the ninety-ninth numero right down to the first espada. He held the megaphone in his right hand and the sheet fresh from Archives in his left, hardly able to wait until he was wielding a sword and sheath instead. Each arrancar appeared in their assigned seat the instant they heard their name called on the speakers, and they waited silently until Aizen-sama would part the curtains and address them on his opaline podium. Aizen was presently exercising his voice into his microphone, wary that his recent lockjaw might inconviently assert itself again.

"Do re mi fa so la ti... ach, I always forget the last note in the arpegio. What was it again?"

_Neriel __Tu__ Oder--"_ Ulquiorra lowered his megaphone momentarily to answer. "'Do' again, sir."

"Ah, that's right. Do re mi fa so la ti--"

Just as Aizen was about to breathe the last note into the microphone, Gin tripped the sandbags backstage and the curtains pulled away a second too early. And so the first image that lodged itself into the young arrancars' collective subconscious was Aizen's mouth forming an O over a phallic object and Tousen in his pyjamas in Ichimaru's arms.

---

"Lord, where is that Di Roy idiot?" chibi Grimmjow was whispering to his buddy. "Doesn't he want the sword he's been raving about for two goddamn days? Wasn't he going to become the 'king of swordsmen'?" he grinned savagely.

"He's probably humping the wall, or some other evolutionary defect," chuckled Shawlong, whose strange helmet made sitting to his right an experience in unique and uncharted forms of discomfort.

"You know, I don't really see the appeal of a sword at all. Just bash his head in with your fists, that's what I always say."

"That's the first time I've ever heard you say that, Grimmjow."

"I'm two days old, Shawlong," Grimmjow growled. "Just you wait till I grow up. Then I'll be the best, most feared half-hollow of the lot."

"I think that's pretty easy for you to say, Mr. 6," said Shawlong.

"You're not so far behind, Mr. 11. Besides, I'll take you along with me on my noble face-smashing adventure."

"Really?" Shawlong turned to face him (and unwittingly conking the arrancar sitting in front of him with his helmet), genuinely surprised by Grimmjow's gesture of friendship.

"So long as you don't object to my beating the shit out of Di Roy whenever I feel like it," he clarified.

_Aaroniero __Arleri... __Nnoitra..._

"Shhh!" hissed the kid whose helmet Shawlong had dealt a critical blow. "The curtains are about to go up!"

"Early birds' privelege," laughed Grimmjow. Then he grew bored with the continued pleas for quiet, so he nonchalantly busted the kid's helmet completely open, knocking him out.

"Hmm," Shawlong observed. "Blue blood. How odd."

Grimmjow tsked and, his tiny, undeveloped hands dripping with the head-liquid, he wiped his fingers over his eyes. "My first kill," he shrugged.

When the curtain did lift, it was Grimmjow who commented first, to no one's surprise.

"Wow. You guys look mad gay."

"How dare you, you impudent..." began Ulquiorra, but Aizen stopped him from advancing with his big strong arm. "Let it go."

"You think they look gay? What about you!?" slurred an eyepatchless Nnoitra, who had not quite yet mastered speech with a crescent-moon mouth. He was seated in the front row with most of the other espada, and had been glaring at Grimmjow as soon as they had been cleared to sonido into the dark, tiered auditorium.

"I've got my abs showing. I can't possibly be gay."

"...You're a brainy guy, Number 6," Nnoitra conceded after some contemplation, "but you can bet your ass I'll be stronger than you some day!"

"Wanna test your luck right now, Number 8?" Grimmjow cracked his knuckles. "I'll make you a privaron before tomorrow!"

"That's enough now, children," spoke Aizen, he and and his shinigami brothers having recovered from their mishap (while Ulquiorra looked on behind them, frowningly uncomprehending). "See this sword?" he continued, without preamble, and that struck the quarrell from memory. "This is a shinigami's zampakuto. It differs substantially from an arrancar's blade in that while both are technically extensions of the self, only the arrancar's wraps around the body and protects him from all harm. Thus, the sword of a half-hollow is inherently superior. Soon you all shall learn never to miss those masks of yours I shattered."

_Huh?_ thought most of the arrancar assembled. But Grimmjow was chewing every word.

"Nevertheless, you must learn the basic strengths and weaknesses of your foes, whether they be hollow, shinigami, or even _human._ Nothing is too bizarre a threat. I am not yet spliced, but there is a reason I haven't used Hougyoku to become a vizard. The older one grows, the easier the transformation becomes to control and to direct, as that much more darkness has shrunk the vizard's heart. I am thus waiting until next winter, as is my friend Tousen, who earlier expressed an interest in finding 'spiritual balance.' Incidentally, Kaname-san has also agreed to demonstrate the mettle of his sword. Kaname, if you would?"

Kaname drew a graceful circle in the air with the flat of his blade and cried, _nake_, Suzumushi."

All but the espada-level arrancar fell asleep.

"Shawlong? Wake up, you moron, you're drooling on my lap. ...Shawlong?"

"That was Tousen-san's shikai, or initial release. Espada are unaffected, but your brethren, weaker-willed and inferior, could not help but succumb to this pitiful state of half-death. Do not let this fate befall you, espada of mine. Remember the ignomity of the espada before you, who failed to be of use to me. However, once you are on the outside, evolving for my cause, you must beware of the tactics your enemies, the shinigami, shall attempt to slay you with. Tousen?"

_So the "knighting" and handing of swords were all a ruse?_ thought Grimmjow. _Oh well, looks like we __espada__ are in the clear._ Then Tousen's lips uttered the lethal words: "Ban kai."

A sphere of darkness swallowed the whole auditorium. Grimmjow stood up and, deprived of his infant senses, stumbled onto his knees. It hurt. He felt like crying and didn't know why.

Tousen savored that justice-y feeling welling inside his palm as the heat spread to his fingers. He was supposed to scar the arrancar in order, of course, but he didn't see any trouble in starting with little trembling Grimmjow, and Sousuke would never know. Here was the espada he'd ordered to wake him up at least three hours ago. Tousen heartlessly plunged his burning index finger into Grimmjow's soft back and slowly carved an excrutiating 6. Kaname was almost glad he'd forgot where he'd put his gloves; if he'd had put them on it would have been a few more seconds before he could punish the child. Ulquiorra, who'd had his 4 traced humanely by Aizen himself, winced and took pity on the tenth espada, whose branding seemed the most painful.

"Now watch, my espada, as your dozing brothers and sisters are subjected to the blazing hand of justice." The sphere became smaller to accomodate Aizen's command, allowing the espada to witness the excessive amount of anguish Tousen was heaping on each individual numero. "Note how they shake and cry out, yet never wake. For a soldier of Aizen Sousuke, it does not do to sleep. It does not do to die. You will be my eyes for all the world. You are all now extensions of myself. I am your god, and you my children. I have seeded your subconscious with all the information you need to evolve. Do not disappoint me."

Grimmjow was not listening anymore. Numero 18's screams filled his head with wonder. Wasn't that the kid whose head he'd cracked open? He's still alive? If Tousen was delivering more pain to 18 than his punch had fifteen minutes ago... just how powerful were these guys?

"...Do not engage a shinigami thinking he cannot grow stronger. It is standard procedure in Soul Society to limit their agentss strength. Suffice it to say that a shinigami may seem less powerful at first than he or she actually is..."

Couldn't Aizen realize he was too distracted to hear him? Numero 69's screams shook his psyche. The espada of Las Noches were not used to such great noise. Then something Aizen said from behind his podium caught Grimmjow's attention anew.

"When I fit each of your masks back on, as I shall shortly," Sousuke said with a smile he simply couldn't help, "you shall forget you ever met me, or became an arrancar. You shall retake your former shapes, but these are merely temporary chrysalises. Invariably you will all return to me before next winter, evolved and informed adults, when the battle proper begins. At that time you shall have undergone my splicing twice, and only then shall I truly be satisfied with my preliminary army's strength and loyalty. There is no question whether your masks will take to shinigamification, because I've already broken them once. I have taught you everything you need to know to grow into my invincible soldiers. The rest is unimportant. Kaname, is that the last?"

"98 have been branded. One is missing"

"Good, good. You will all retain your current rank upon reentry; promotions and demotions will then be parcelled as appropriate." Aizen walked gingerly down from the stage, cradled the weeping Yammy in his arms, and compassionately fused his mask back on with Hougyoku. Yammy gurgled and his body began to warp, bubble and inflate until he was once again an Adjuchas menos. A slavering and dumb one.

No. Grimmjow resolved to keep his memory. There were things more important than staying alive, than serving people stronger than you _just_ to stay alive. He would meet his posse again. Together they would rebel, and die honorably.

The last thing Grimmjow saw before he lost himself to his mask was Aizen's smiling face.

"Huh. The lockjaw isn't setting in again," said Aizen as he rubbed his cheek, inside an auditorium now crawling with dazed menos.

"Maybe it was a fluke!" said Ichimaru.

"Let them all out, Kaname. They'll gain their wits eventually. It'll be just like three days ago for them."

The noise Suzumushi emitted filled the menos with terror. It was a sound they now associated with incredible pain, and one by one they scampered out the exit of Las Noches into the clear night.

"What about me, Aizen-sama?"

"You're coming with me, wee one."

"Where to?"

Aizen crouched and put an arm around Ulquiorra's shoulder, gazing out the auditorium's sole, barred window with a romantic look in his eyes. "How would you like to hear a history lesson, Ulquiorra?"

"What about?"

"About the only important topic in all of Hueco Mundo--my rise to power."

"Why are you only telling me?"

"Because I've taken a liking to you. I've decided to guide your evolution myself. Come now... off into the desert!" Aizen and Ulquiorra clasped hands and he led them out, leaving only Tousen and Ichimaru in the massive fortress.

"Why do you think he spared Ulquiorra?" asked Gin.

"That's easy," said Tousen, sitting himself down on the stage. "Because he's lonely."

"Want some tea?"

They enjoyed a nice night chatting alone in the dark.

---

It was after Di Roy had absently sauntered off a balcony ledge that he discovered he could fly!

"Hey mister!" he asked a sky-winding reptilian Adjuchas that not seconds ago was named Nnoitra. Evidently Di had no concept of fear. "Isn't this fun!" He was still waiting for six o'clock, so there was still time to have fun before he received his sword. He flailed an imaginary blade in midair and put on his best master swordsman look. "Do you have any grape soda, sir?"

Nnoitra reared his slimy fangs and lunged at Di Roy. Di only narrowly escaped with his jugular vein, but he instantly forgot there had been any danger at all and pestered Nnoitra even more. "Do you like swords, sir?"

"What is this babble? Do you want to die!?" Nnoitra found it much easier to talk now--but when had he any difficulty? He couldn't for the life of him remember. Ah well, might as well talk as much as he could, to exercise his voice. "I said, do you wanna die!?"

"I like birds." Di Roy puffed up his cheeks and swam through the clouds. Did he mean fish?

"Well, yes, I suppose I do too, but that has nothing to do with our discussion," said the leathery-winged snake monster. Nnoitra might have even liked Di Roy in another life... were he not an utter spaz. "Though I profess a certain affection for the blue-footed ocean gull. Whenever I stop by earth for a light snack to tie me over, I always check whether I can't stuff my face with them!"

"I want a thousand birds in my cheeks. Weee!" Di Roy opened his mouth wide and flew in blind figure-8s, as if hoping to catch birds between his spiky teeth. It was the most intellectual pair of sentences to ever come out of his mouth.

"Okay, I would never have previously thunk there was a line of acceptable behavior to be crossed, but you just crossed it." Nnoitra meteor-whipped Di Roy back to earth with his thick scaly tail. Di Roy clutched his bloodied eye and whimpered all the hundreds of feet, never thinking of simply standing on air before hitting the sand with an awesome thud. Nnoitra upturned his lips and slithered through a portal out of Hueco Mundo. He had a sudden hankering for soul of blue-footed ocean gull.

"G-Grimmjow..." said Di Roy, having landed conveniently close to the struggling panther.

"Di Roy," came his rusty, metallic voice. "Di Roy... before I lose my memory completely..." He bashed his head repeatedly against a nearby rock, as though hoping to latch on a little longer to the last two days. "Gather the gang... Shawlong... join him. Tell them to look... look for me. This is very important, Di Roy. Di Roy..." Bash. Bash. Bash. "Go now, before I lose my temper!"

"But... my eye!" he sobbed.

"GO!" snarled Grimmjow, and suddenly his demonically intense eyes filled Di Roy's fading vision as he pounced on him. "Go or I will devour you here! Find him! FIND SHAWLONG!"

"O--okay."

Having heard Di Roy's assent, Grimmjow's eyes rolled up and he fainted on his side. Di Roy promptly forgot his mission and fainted as well. He was only a baby...


	3. THE METEOR!

**Ch. 3: The METEOR **ながれぼし!

"There's no need to frown, Ulquiorra-kun. Just let go of gravity and join me."

Ulquiorra jumped up and down to grab Aizen's suspended ankle. His expression didn't change. At this rate he would never learn to skywalk.

"Remember, Ulquiorra. It is not the earth that's holding you down, it is you who clings to the earth. When you cut that most childish of attachments, then there is only one direction left to go: up." A pack of cirrus clouds shined clear against the dome of night. A good omen?

Ulquiorra screwed himself for that liberating leap, but he only tripped in midair and fell facefirst back into cold hard reality. Rubbing the sand from his eyes with malformed hands, he felt frustrated enough to finally ask the question that had been bothering him since they began their training at noon when the moon hovered just over the horizon--its lowest point. Aizen had promised he'd learn to fly along with the moon. The question: "What's up there anyway?"

Sousuke didn't hesitate to reply, as though he expected young Ulquiorra to understand immediately. "A vast vacuum that's ours to fill. To rule. To eliminate."

"But... what does that mean?"

Aizen shook his head and sighed. He often forgot just how unenlightened his progeny remained, even after so many cycles of natural selection. "I'm sorry, little one: sometimes I fail to acknowledge that the concept is generally beyond the capacity of mere mortal imagination. But worry not, for when you become an adult it shall seem as though you'd _always_ known."

"...Okay," said Ulquiorra. "But when will that be?"

"When you pull your sword from inside your soul."

"But..."

"What is it, Ulquiorra?" said Aizen, plummeting to earth alongside his patience. Hovering just above the rippling sand, he regarded Ulquiorra as a great mother vulture would its plump, expendable chick. "Let us set aside idle talk for later. Catch me if you can. Now or never!"

"But I've already unleashed my sword!" he blurted, afraid he would lose Aizen forever.

"..._What?_" Aizen's tone turned sharp, antagonistic. The avuncular glint in his eyes vanished utterly. He touched down and strode towards the boy at once. "Ulquiorra, is this true?"

"I don't know its name yet, but I… I…" Ulquiorra's fists strained at his sides and let it all out. "When you called me and I opened the door and you weren't there I thought you must be in trouble and I traced you to Ichimaru-sama's bedroom and I had to open the door somehow…!"

Aizen scowled. "So you unleashed your sword at that moment and unlocked it?"

Ulquiorra nodded.

Aizen smirked. "You foolish child. I promised you I'd hand out your sword the next day."

"But you never did!" Ulquiorra managed to object before his breath shrank suddenly back into his windpipe.

"Ulquiorra-kun, did you think such an insignificant accomplishment would be enough to impress me? To 'save' me? Did you think disobeying me—disrupting my plan—was worthy of praise?"

"N-no, n-never disobeyyyy," Ulquiorra choked.

"Ulquiorra."

The espada lay barely conscious on the sand, his tiny body shuddering with every rasping attempt to answer. The haze of the desert seemed to boil around him, and he was swallowed by the peculiar sensation that his skin was peeling away.

Aizen said it again. "Ulquiorra."

"A-Aizen-sama..." For a split second the distant overwhelming image of his master falling backwards into the sun (the sun!) burned the backs of Ulquiorra's retinas, but he could not cry. He blinked and glanced away, and the sky laughed redly at his weakness. In this realm sound was color and sight was blindness. The rasping continued, an unpleasant sensation; he opened his eyes once more. Blackness and whiteness. Three blurry fledgling fingers were reaching for the sky. His left hand. The rest of him was numb.

The sun laughed at him and spat on him, then all sound stopped. The sweat on his skin was sizzling. His chest was slowly emptying of air as his pupils rolled back--Ugh!

Sousuke's voice carried as though he were holding Ulquiorra up to his mouth by the ear. "I have rent the spirit matter around you. You can no longer properly breathe." He could hear Aizen's lips brim with terrible mirth. "Ulquiorra... this is the vacuum. This is Death!"

The night broke over them again, and the imaginary sun bled away. Aizen, breathing hard, relaxed his grip around Ulquiorra's throat and let him clatter like a blade with an unnoticed crack. Ooph! It had apparently taken a considerable amount of effort not to go all the way with the defenseless espada. But Aizen Sousuke was not unmerciful. His hakama flapped violently in the wind. "Get up," he said, barely audible, "and I shall forgive you."

But Ulquiorra never hit the sand; he was levitating inches above it. "Aizen-sama, Aizen-sama!" he exulted between gasps, "I did it!"

"Of course you did," Aizen smiled. "Only those who meet Death firsthand are truly prepared to let their inhibitions fall away. Of course, some who commune with Death choose to run rather than embrace. You made the correct decision today. Skywalking is the first step to learning outright flight."

That may have been the case, but Ulquiorra didn't think he liked it. It was unnecessary drain on his spirit energy, he surmised. It was illogical—you could just sonido you wanted and it would take less effort than fl-flying! It was a reckless excess. It was freeing. It was scary.

"Rise, Ulquiorra. Rise with me."

Ulquiorra gulped. He lay immobile over the sweeping sediment as Aizen ascended unto glorious nothingness, becoming smaller and smaller, disappearing into the clouds. He was a meteor, burning up. He blinked through a bead of sweat. He couldn't bring himself to—no, he didn't _want_ to follow. Then realization struck him with dizzying clarity:

He no longer wished to evolve. He merely wished to _cling,_ to subsist as he was, to be caught up in the swirl of events on the surface, like any unambitious bottom dweller who enjoys life.

He let himself plop back onto the sand, and as the little grey grains played by his face, he smiled for the first and last time.

"Ulqui-"

"Aizen-sama," he interrupted, having lain there for a while. "I don't think I'll be flying. And I don't think I'm going to be eating hollows anymore, either."

Ulquiorra didn't know how the shinigami would react to this bold statement. He didn't much care. What would happen, would happen. He didn't take his eyes away from the moon in the sky, for all else was dark.

To his surprise, Aizen didn't get angry or scoff at his defiant remarks. He laughed. Openly, without a hint of the bloodlust or morbidity that characterized every other such instance. This was an anomaly. Ulquiorra shifted himself to rest on his white elbow and gazed up at his master.

"Oh? Your eyes are so round, little one." Aizen sat himself down next to Ulquiorra and parked his chin on his fist. "You remind me of myself when I was younger, Ulquiorra-kun."

"H-how? In what way?"

"Haha…" Aizen tousled Ulquiorra's unhelmeted half of hair. "Why don't we spend the rest of this lovely evening walking through that history I promised you earlier? Like when _I _ate my first hollow…"

"You ate a hollow!?"

"More than one! I ate an entire hive of detached Gillian remnants, which could no longer recombine, but needed to stick together for survival. I was experimenting, rather crudely, on becoming half-hollow, some seven thousand years ago during my seminal travels in Hueco Mundo…"

"Wait, you're going too fast, Aizen-sama! Start from the beginning," Ulquiorra frowned.

"Glad to see you so eager again!" said Aizen. "I'm afraid if you don't push yourself harder you'll never actualize your potential to become my prime espada. Though I believe I know what you're trying to do."

"What do you—"

"Start at the beginning, eh?" Aizen faced his putative protégé and flashed a familiar smirk. "Which one?"

-- -- --

Urahara snapped his uchiwa fan shut and called the meeting to commence. "All right, everybody, I assume you all know why we're here."

"Yeah!" shouted Renji. "To kick Aizen's bastard ass!"

"I couldn't have put it more succinctly myself, Abarai-san, but please do refrain from slamming the table with your fist a second time. Call me kooky, but I do prefer my priceless tea sets intact."

Someone who suspiciously sounded like Ishida snickered softly in the shadows by the refrigerator. The lamp swiveled overhead, casting its orange beam back and forth across the circle of those assembled. Ichigo looked embarrassed by association. "Oh, er… sorry about that," said Renji, scratching the back of his mane before sitting politely back down.

"That's okay, _isourou_--the table's big enough to withstand your puny girly punches."

"That's enough, Jinta. No more calling Abarai a freeloader!" Urahara tilted his hat to cover his eyes and bared his pearly teeth. "Even though he is one," he concluded.

"God, Kisuke, just get on with this damn thing. I have pressing matters to attend to elsewhere."

"What, like fixing your bra?"

"Your butterfly said this was urgent, you jack—"

"So just turn into a cat. I don't see what the big fuss is."

"You don't see most things that are right in front of your face!"

"Settle down, you two, we're not here to declare alpha status," Hitsugaya grumbled. "We're here to learn."

Urahara tactfully apologized, and then asked if everyone was comfortable in their respective seats. Ishida returned to the table with a fresh glass of orange juice. Renji picked his ear with his pinky. Rukia was affecting the solemn observer, and Chad was blending in by not belonging. No surprises on any of those counts. Ichigo regarded Urahara with puzzlement. What Yoruichi had said just accused him of was a pretty serious attack on his character; in Ichigo's mind, this last jab was way too personal to be simple knee-jerk trash talk, or playful banter. If Yoruichi had told _him _that he didn't see things right in front of him, he would most assuredly take umbrage. And yet there Urahara was, cheerful as ever, cracking wise and assuring everyone of the awesomeness of his super unbeatable plan. Just when you think you've got somebody figured out…

"All right, gang, before Shihouin-sama starts to prattle on and on about _duties_ and _lost wages_, let's get this show on the road. I've got here, in my hands, a deck of cards with the faces of each of our most notorious arrancar friends. I'm going to pass one card face-down to everybod—except for you, Soi Fong, 'cause you're already eyeballing me as though I were some horrid mole rat—and on the count of three I want you to take a peek at your new buddies. Three, two, one! Soak them in. Study them. Now put 'em back face-down!"

Ichigo slammed his card on the table and crossed his arms, trying to remember details of the arrancar on his card. Blue hair, definitely male, sword strapped against his lower back… but he couldn't remember what his face looked like. Wait, was his hair even blue, or had it been purple and he just couldn't make it out in the relative dark?

"So, any observations? Yes, _Ishida_, is it?"

"_My_ arrancar, at least, seemed to have his hollow hole about eighteen centimenters below where his heart should be located—is that just a mutation or defect?"

"Excellent question, Uryuu! No, I'm afraid that is no defect; it is a little quirk I designed into the hougyoku as a sort of scientific watermark. Every arrancar with a displaced hole is evidence that I contributed, however indirectly, to his creation."

Awkward silence.

"…And now, to distract from my awkward admission of guilt, I'll pick one of you at random. Eeny, meeny, miney, Ichigo! Ball's in your court!"

"Uh, my guy was sorta buff for a baby, had blue hair, I think, and… uh… come back to me?"

"No problem, except I won't. Maybe I should rephrase the question: Any _useful _observations?"

"I'm observing that I'm out the door unless you start the damn story," said Hitsugaya. "Stop stalling."

"What's this all for?" asked Yoruichi.

"Well, I was _trying_ to demonstrate how all these infant arrancar of Aizen's seem to share regular characteristics—such as the displaced hole (thank you Ishida), the shattered mask, the humanoid shape, and so on. However, back when I was researching the phenomenon of half-hollows, none of these features had been ironed out, or even outlined. We simply had no idea what a genuine half-hollow looked like. They could have been the size of ducklings, or sported multiple heads."

"What's your point?" cut in Soi Fong with undisguised scorn.

"My point is that this was all still experimental, and while I do shoulder most of the blame for this fine mess, I want you all to understand that my intentions were pure. How was I to know I'd been writing the blueprints for the manufacture of a massive army to serve a blood-lusting megalomaniac? So, uh, try to empathize with me a bit, all right?"

"I can't speak for anybody else, Urahara-san," started Ichigo, "but I'm willing to forgive everything if you answer me just one question."

"Name it, my good man," said Urahara, who had begun to fan himself.

"When I was wasting away in the pit, utterly helpless to do anything but watch my spirit chain nibble away at itself, were you deliberately _attempting_ to make me into a vizard?"

Urahara moved to open the window. "Heh heh, is it just me or is it getting a bit muggy in here?"

"What is a vizard?" grunted Chad.

"A half-hollow, only the other way around. Answer the boy's question, Kisuke," said Yoruichi.

"Yes, answer his question, Urahara-taichou," Soi Fong parroted.

"The depth of my clemency hinges heavily on your next words, Urahara-san," said Hitsugaya.

"All right, all right," Urahara conceded, sitting back down, "I can feel the general drift of opinion whooshing away. Just don't all maul me at once. Listen, I honestly don't know _what_ I was trying to do with you, Ichigo—test your capabilities, get high off your suffering, whatever, in the end it's all the same, right? Yet I can tell you, without a hint of hesitation, that creating another half-hollow was the absolute farthest thing from my thoughts. Still is. Anybody dissatisfied by this response?"

Yoruichi smiled. "Sounds like vintage you."

"Yeah, and I'm not sure that's a good thing. I'm just relieved I'm not your pawn after all," said Ichigo.

"So are bygones, bygone?"

"We're cool, for now. But no repeat offenses. I'm afraid that's the death penalty," Ichigo joked.

"Glad we could come to an agreement. I'd shake your hand, but since I'm too lazy to go all the way around to your side of the table, I'm just going to ask the folks on my right to pass this handshake down to him. Yoruichi, pleasure."

The atmosphere of the room lightened up substantially, though whether that was because of Urahara's charm or because Matsumoto had just entered fashionably late carrying several gourds of sake, was anybody's guess. Okay, it was pretty obviously the sake. Nevertheless, Urahara was happy to replay his story to his kind of audience—a forgiving, receptive, oh so slightly inebriated one.

FLASHBACK

"_Yoru, you can't leave! You're the CAPTAIN!" Urahara sulked, twiddling his thumbs with mechanical perfection on her partially-made bed. "The orders come from _you, _don't they!"_

"_Kisuke," she responded testily as she slipped on her mobile corps vest in front of the mirror, "you don't seem to understand how this captain business works. It's not a license to do whatever you want. The robe comes with obligations."_

"_Yeah, yeah, I know—to your subordinates, to Seireitei, to Soul Society and earth. I get it. But surely you don't have to take every single mission that falls in your lap!"_

"_If I want to assert myself amidst this vain sea of egos and testosterone, yes, I do. And by the way, Kisuke…" She reappeared like a flash behind him and, snaking her arms around his chest, leant into his ear. "Unless you want to prove that robe really is too big for you, I suggest you assert yourself as well. I'm going to be away for a long while. Why don't you look for some friends besides me?"_

_She traced the number twelve on the bare portion of his scrawny nape, and the next thing he knew she was gone, the only clue of her departure the gentle breeze that now played against the curtains. God he loved that woman._

_But now that he was in the Gotei 13, surrounded by… people… he realized it wasn't considered normal to obsess over an only friend. The thought of having "friends," in the plural, had never occurred to him before his inauguration. It was simply too much to thrust on him all at once!_

"_Okay, that's it—no more moping!" Urahara told his reflection, which looked rather handsome with a five o'clock shadow. "I'm going to get up out of bed, brush myself off, stride right into that jolly old sun, and _mingle_!"_

_With a huge grin plastered on his face like his life depended on it, Kisuke fitted on his new white beach hat from off the nearby jacket rack, indulged in a nice stretch, and plopped back into bed, burying his face into Yoruichi's pillow. He inhaled her distinctive catwoman smell as a parched nomad might greet an oasis._

_Then an idea struck him. If he simply interacted with the various folk outside until he discovered people who shared his interests, as he assumed other people wangled it, it would waste a lot of time to make relatively few friends. However, if he devised some method of drawing said like-minded people to _him_, he'd reel in plenty of friends while saving tons of effort! It was time for the First Annual Seireitei Science Fair!_

_Captains could do that, right?_

_--_

"_Urahara-taichou, I must say it is an honor to meet you in person! Youngest ever head of the research department! You're a true genius."_

_Kisuke shook the young man's hand and humbly deflected the compliment. "Nah, it's easy once you set your mind to it. But thanks, uh…"_

"_Ah, how rude of me! I'm Aizen, Aizen Sousuke."_

"_Oh, that's right, Shinji's lieutenant! Come to think of it I don't see you two together that often. Are you enrolled in some other organization too? Ah, forgive me, sometimes I'm so nosy… I'm still kind of new at this," Urahara smiled, scratching his head. "So how do you like the fair so far?"_

"_It's amazing! I think the exhibit of your experiments in particular has inspired me to pursue a career in the sciences, though I doubt I'll ever reach your level of brilliance."_

"_Oh, you know what they say: no one's not a master at what he loves," he rebuffed, embarrassed. "Or something."_

"_Urahara-taichou, I couldn't agree more."_

"_Uhp, seems I'm wanted elsewhere!" Three wide-eyed fanboys were pulling on his arm and demanding he explain his theory of particle resonance. "Catch you later, man!"_

_The man left Sousuke with a favorable impression of pliability, but this easygoing attitude did not always translate into "easy to manipulate." Aizen would have to monitor the man more closely if he had any hope of prying away the secrets of the notoriously cautious man. Aizen would have to make him believe he's his comrade. For Urahara was correct—no one's not a master at what he loves. What Aizen wanted to become, however, was a master _of_ what he loved._

_--_

"_Aizen-san, swords by the door! And hand me the triclorophenamine. No, the bluer beaker, not the one that sort of looks green. Yeah, that one."_

_Urahara's private laboratory, where Aizen was currently "moonlighting," surprised him by its sparseness. "More time fretting over appearances is less time getting to the bottom of things!" Kisuke had laughingly admonished when he'd first brought it up. Over the weeks the wooden shelves gradually became stocked with more and more bubbling beakers, many of Kisuke's invention, but that must have meant that he was only able to acquire such chemicals due to his high rank._

"_That's partly why I took the job," he assured him._

_But then how had he conducted his experiments beforehand?_

"_Nature is the beginner's stockroom, Aizen-san. It was She who supplied a lost and bored little boy with Her fascinating host of treasures, and She who guided him to a life of, ahem, public service. And now the little boy hopes he's been fruitful enough to make up for Her valuable time!" he joked._

_Is that why he wore a green lab coat? As a tribute to Nature?_

"_Yes. Except for the hat. That's for the ladies to admire."_

_Urahara may have been perfectly content treating Nature as a wonderfully replete storehouse, but Aizen wouldn't tire until it became his personal playground._

"_Thanks. Triclorophenamine is a tricky one. Normally it's one of the most inert of all fluids, but when held by one's left hand for more than a few seconds it becomes positively explosive! …Suppose I should have told you that before I asked you to hand it over. Oh well. Observe, Aizen-san, what happens when we pour a single drop of it onto the ground pollen of a night blossom indigenous to Zaraki!"_

"_Why, what happens?"_

"_We're about to find out!"_

_The force of the reaction knocked Kisuke smack into the wall behind him. "Puh!"_

"_Urahara-taichou, are you all right!?"_

"_Yeah, I'm okay…" Kisuke picked himself up off the laboratory floor and rubbed his eyes. "Man, stuff got everywhere…"_

"_Taichou, your coat…"_

"_Was gunning for a cure for spirit narcolepsy, new, stronger stimulant… and irony nearly knocked me unconscious!"_

"_Taichou, your face!"_

_His vision refocused and he looked down at his coat. Perfect white lines! "How captivating! The Zaraki pollen must have attacked the foreign agent in waves of repulsive spores with split-second reaction time! And so uniform… That must be how it spreads itself around! Or how it protects itself from pollen-eaters like hell butterflies! Needs more research! Look, dude, it's so acidic it ate the green right off the fabric of my clothes, like bleach! But then wouldn't my face be burning right now?"_

_The pollen had clearly affected his skin the same way, as a broad white line ran down each eye. Kisuke felt his face with his fingers, pinched some of the pollen's residue, and took a whiff. He figured out instantly why it didn't hurt. It was a powerful psychotropic drug._

"_Urahara-taichou!"_

"_Aizen-kun, where did you get that pretty unicorn?"_

"_Huh?"_

"_Yay! I'm dancing! I'm dancing!"_

"_Okay, calm down. You're just hallucinating."_

_Urahara lifted Aizen up by the collar with improbable strength. "How can I be calm when the stars are so naked?"_

_Aizen struggled to wrest himself free of the jumpy captain's grip. "Okay, maybe they're not hallucinations. Maybe you're just insane!"_

"_You're right. Naptime!" Urahara was asleep before he hit the floor._

_Watching almost affectionately as his boss began to suck his thumb in his slumber, Aizen could think a hundred uses for this new Bleach, and none of them involved treating spirit narcolepsy._

--

Ulqui yawned.

"Will that all be all for today?" asked Aizen.

"I don't really understand where this story is going, Aizen-sama. Perhaps we should postpone it for another night?"

"Yes, you're correct, Ulquiorra-kun. It does a soldier no good to keep vigil for too long. _Exequias_!"

Two appeared before him and genuflected. "Your orders, my liege."

"Keep watch while I retire. Some spirit energy is fluctuating in the vicinity, but I can't pinpoint its location. If it's an ambush or a reishi bomb, you contact me immediately, understood?"

Little Ulquiorra rubbed each eye with his good hand. "W-what's going on?"

"Don't fret, it' probably nothing. Occasionally Las Noches is host to some unusual, seemingly originless outbursts of energy. Often they manifest as harmless auroras. But one can never be too sure."

"It's coming from over there," Ulquiorra stated, pointing.

"Oh? But how can you be so sure?"

"It's Yammy. His old Adjuchas shell is beginning to reject his soul. Either he'll revert back into a Gillian or he'll…"

"Disintegrate. How interesting." It was getting chilly, so Aizen tucked his arms inside his sleeves. "What are you going to do?"

Ulquiorra pulled his sword from within his own soul and swore, "I'm going to save him."

Yammy's Adjuchas form morphed and bubbled painfully on the dark sands, a creature in fatal flux. He would have to time his strike just right. Ulqui raised his sword even above the tip of his helmet's horn and plunged. The unrecognizable beast that was Yammy howled, but Ulquiorra was grown up enough now not to need to cover his ears. The Hollow began to form a basic skeleton up and around the blade as though it were a spine, and when the last vertebra slid into place Ulquiorra swiftly flicked his sword away from Yammy's inky innards.

"What is he supposed to _be_?" Ulquiorra looked quizzically upon Yammy's strange carapace.

"Some cross between a lizard, a gibbon and a cockroach."

Ulquiorra couldn't tell whether that was a joke. Yammy growled and pawed the sand, glowering with deep red slits on the sides of his face. "Seems he can't talk yet."

"Were you planning to demand his subservience to you for this act of compassion?" Aizen asked.

"I wont need to give any orders. Once he re-evolves back into the Yammy I remember, the subconscious suggestion that he owes some debt to me will enforce itself."

"He won't be the Yammy you remember, little one. When he evolves again he will take the form of a human _adult_, instead of that of an infant. It's entire objective of this exercise."

"But then how will _I_ become an adult, if you don't graft my mask back on with Hyogyoku like you did with the others…?"

"You're my experiment to see whether I can cut out the middleman, so to speak, and correct errors without having to revert the subject back into its original form."

"Oh."

Ulquiorra didn't like the idea of being an object to be used to collect data. He didn't like the idea of being a Kisuke.

--

"And that's my story," finished Ulquiorra.

"What!? You never got up to Hollowification, you just stopped at some anecdote about pollen or something," Ichigo accused.

"But that's an integral part of the story. Much more important than technical discussions of particle splicing. It's the story of how I inadvertently invented the chemical that would give Aizen his ludicrous power (unbeknownst to me)."

"…You said that was the end of the story," said Hitsugaya.

"No, I said that was the end of _my_ story. Next, I'll tell you what I've been able to uncover of what my first apprentice, who quickly quit his position with me afterwards due to 'scheduling conflicts,' did with my concoction behind my back. Next is Aizen's story."


End file.
